New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1887-04-24
OLD STORIES.
THEIR GENESIS AND DEVELOPMENT.

humility than the study Of folklore and popular
tales, for nothing so clearly exhiplts the harro"
limitations Of the human Imagination ana .ho
extopt to which all the world from the earliest
recorded period until now. has been amusing itself
with warmed.up versions OF the same hoarv
old stories Mr.. Clouston has IN these Two pretty
and handsome volumes brought together COL
lection of popular tales with their variants a'o
rether unriyaled In English literature Oui.
critics have sometimes questioned inc utiity Oh
suob studies and accounted them trivial. but this
,rort Z. conclusive yindication of the line Of re-
search 10 illustrates inasmuch as 1t abounds with
evidence of the most direct, important and unmis-
akable character wing the currents OF informa-
tion flowing from the East to the West and demon
sratjno tho depth of the dependence OF tho latter
upon the former. c,
II ia n great addition to the value OF Mr.. Cious-
TOMS work that he has theories to nurse we are
relieved to find him very shy OF sun-mytn e1phca-
tions moreover. and while he judiciously avoids
controversy with the school OF which Sn George
Cox is perhaps the most conspicuous example, ne
takes occasion to declare himself by no means
convert to tho solar hypothesis HIS purpose Is
merely to trace the stories as Tar DacK as possoe
To follow them to their cradle In any instance Is
impracticable. but whom we have got tho root Oh
story fairly fixed In India we have right to con-
,nda that wa have come near enough to Its genesis,
and that Il is fresh proof Of our indebtedness to
onr Arvan ancestry There are curiously few pop
Mar tales which cannot be traced. From the con-
tinent of Europe to the wds OF Africa all nations
and tribes have battened upon the creations OF the
Oriental imagination. The Legends ana laDleS
which each nation has localized ana changed py
accretion of It's Idiosyncracies In nearly every
instance proceeded out Of Hindustan. what Is al
most eoualv interesting Is the extent of the worlds
indebtedness to Buddhist legends and traditlons.
II NAV be that many which now pass for buddhist
ontedate the age OF Gautama, and were merely
gathered together then. or perhaps IN tho time OF
Asoka and the Great Convention which settied the
Buddhist Canon Even this last event. however oc'
curred two nturies and half before the Christian
era -,
Tba ouestion whether old Egypt drew from India
or India from Eqypt Is not concusivey deter-
mined though the weight OF evidence Is we thinK
I'm favor of India Many European folk tales can
be traced to the land of the Phara0hs, ana some OF
than can be followed no further, though tins Is
only negative testimony and liable TO misleau IL
accorded too much Importance vi course MI
Clouston wholly discards and discredts the theory
of separate invention. That has become untenaoe
with the advance Of investigation. Inc RESENT
bances are too many and close to be explained on
any other hypothesis than that of common origin.
II Is indeed surprising to the uninstruced reader 10
| he told that some story which he Is familiar Win
| AZ localized In his own country is drawn from
| Buddhist Birth-Story. or from the lalnud Dut
in fact nothing Is more common, ana 'hls 700 III Tic
| case Of even those popular fotions which seem nj
first sight rooted deep in the soil oil their present
habitat -
Take the story of" Little Fairly" that capital
Jrisb tale which Samuel Lover told so well. liz
| every line seems full-havored Hibernian; YET
variants of IL arc found in Spain, Italy. France
| Germany. Greece and dozen other countries OF
the old world and far beyond the modern history
| of Europe il appears in India and Arabia LAKE
again the story Of the dog Gellert which has Deen
so strongly localized in Wales. Tho original Is
Hindoo tale and IN the place of the dog and the
wolf n mongoose and a snake figure. Ana III ilk'
manner we might follow hundred familiar stories
| They all lead us back to the brOodlng East
There is the nursery of the human race ana thence
also "a Is fitting proceed its nursery tales. Jaef
,ha Ciant Killer was really an early Aryan. Tit
dragons that 80 nfest our ancient LEGENDS were no
sun myths or cloud or storm myths, bnt be
Ionoed 10 that race of "mOnstrous efts when One
were 4" Iords of earth Primitive man, moro Deas
than human being. contemporary OF the cave pea
and the saber-toothed tiger. contemporary also
the mammoth and some survivors OF tho grea
saurian families, must have impaired rudeiy to NJ
children the terrors Of hostile encounter with Tn
monsters. and hence the dragon brood 80 too Il
| the legends Of huge birds may be impaired IN
survival of some fact in nature Even now Is no
the roc of Arabian story cmulated by the iivln
condorf And does not pal1ontology warrant Ia
belief that the air was peopled in prehistoric tim
with inhabitants as strange and portenious a
| tbose which crawled and walked upon the land, o
SWAN and floatcd in the oceanr
Originality can no longer be claimed for Europe
however. 1t is trne that Egypt runsa close rae
with India in the invention OF stories. ana sine
modern research has brought TO light records iroi
tho banks of the Nile whose antiquity Ia establishe
by the strongest and most specific evidence ther
ia disposition in some quarters to award the paii
of priority to the last discovered relics Tho prof
! ability that Egypt supplied India on tho one han
and Europe on the other with folk-tales IS never
tbeless in need OF much confederation ms yet, an
!. ContoIn Burton's theory, that Egyptian legend
I, went TO India and there became amalgamated wit
| ruder local stories thence eventually hlterln
= | through 10 Europe seems rather strained. But
either case tho source of such stories is raceabe
Egypt or India, and for several OF them an antiqu
~ of from three to four thousand years s proves
When therefore venerable tales Of this character al
naturalizcd IN Western countries, and, a. mas oite
hoep the case. reformed about some historical pc
sonage. the tendency of mankind to repetitlon
= | strikinGly illustrated as also the truth OF u
y | Preachers remark that there is nothing new una
= the sun. The jest books Of to-day and yesterda
are but compilations and the mon of the nineteent
e century Of the Christian era laugh at Jokes oil
3 funny anecdotes which convused the midrhs
the ancient Egyptians. Even the modern pre-
X sometimes unconscionsly prolongs the life
Q some one Of these antique fragments, and we @
4 counter, disguised In the costume OF the perio
and given an aspect of freshness by the free use
% contemporaneous names and places. narrati'
t, which may be traced to the Costa Romanorun, al
backward from that medi@val collection TO q
Jataka, OF Buddhist Birth-Stories
Mr.. Clouston has not aimed at an exhaust
% assembage of these legends and hctions, but
b,s t,vo thick volumes he has gathered large nul